Directors of the nonprofit group Danville Area Cultural Alliance are locked in a bitter battle with town officials over the closure of the 18-year-old Danville Fine Arts Gallery.

Leaders of the struggling arts group have publicly accused the town of not doing enough to help them reopen their gallery, which closed in November for myriad reasons, including dwindling funds and volunteers, the group’s board members say.

One big issue was access. Visitors and volunteers with the Danville Area Cultural Alliance, known as DACA for short, previously had complained about the lack of disabled access to the gallery. It is located up a steep set of stairs on the second floor of the town-owned Village Theatre on Front Street.

“DACA has attempted to resolve the issue with the town for the past year, with no results,” DACA secretary Fred Turner wrote in a recent letter to the editor of the Contra Costa Times. “The town says DACA is responsible for complying with ADA law. However, the town owns the building.”

Town officials say DACA’s newly elected board is trying to bully town officials into giving the group amenities to which it isn’t entitled. “They think if they drum up some publicity the town is going to be pressured into providing them an alternate gallery — not a valid assumption,” said Town Manager Joe Calabrigo.

Since 1989, DACA has leased the gallery space from the town for a nominal rate. About 250 local artists and arts supporters are on DACA’s mailing list. The dues-paying group held weekly classes and exhibits in the gallery, which was also open daily to visitors.

In 2005, a disabled resident wanting to take an art class complained about the lack of accessibility to the gallery for patrons with disabilities, Calabrigo said. Fearing a liability issue, Danville officials and DACA’s sitting board members agreed to move the classes out of the gallery, Calabrigo said. The town offered up another space at the community center where DACA could hold its classes.

DACA, which for the past several years has struggled to raise money and keep volunteers, in October laid off its executive director. A new board was elected in November.

Turner, among those newly elected, says town leaders should let his group move the gallery to the first floor of the Village Theatre, where a number of town offices currently are located. The more accessible location would help DACA attract new volunteers and visitors.

“To me it just seems so common-sensical,” Turner said.

But Danville officials say they are under no such obligation to give them free space.

The arts group has fallen short of its original goal to raise money and work with the town to promote other established arts programs in Danville, said Loucy DeAtley, a founding DACA member who served as president of the group for four years during the mid-1990s.

“The gallery was just one arm of DACA,” DeAtley said. “There are a lot of people out there who are simply stunned by the misinformation that (DACA board members) are putting out there, not only about DACA’s purpose but DACA’s relationship with the town.”

In particular, town officials say they oppose a proposal by DACA’s board shortly before the gallery closed to grant exclusive exhibition rights to a private group of artists — something they say would contradict the community-oriented goals of the organization.

Danville Town Councilwoman Karen Stepper said council members would consider doing something to help DACA reopen the gallery. But, Stepper said, more discussion with DACA’s board about the role the organization should play in the community is needed.

“The council will look at this an opportunity to look at the overall program and its original mission to raise funds for the arts in the Valley,” she said.